I look up from the reports I’m wading through—more and more of absolutely fucking nothing—to find Atalanta standing in my doorway. “I thought you were supposed to be leading a team searching for Circe.”
Atalanta is a handsome Black woman with medium-brown skin and scars across her face and hands. She wears her black curls back in a stylized mohawk. For as long as I’ve known her, at least until this last year, she worked under Artemis. But after the events of Minos’s party, she transferred to Athena.
I’ve always liked her. She would have made a stellar Ares. But Ican’t deny having my sister in the Ares position benefits the city as a whole, and me especially. I don’t have to worry about Olympian forces turning against me when Helen—Ares—is in charge.
“I’m headed out again shortly.” She leans against the doorway, apparently settling in for a conversation I very much don’t want to have.
I sigh and motion Atalanta forward. “I assume you’re here to give me a report, not just to engage in gossip.”
“You know me, Zeus. I only gossip when I’m commanded to.” She waves her phone at me. “I’ve sent you everything we have, as Athena ordered. All of the video feeds around the area where Circe came out of the water came back clean. There’s no sign of her or her people anywhere. Which means that either she’s a ghost—”
“Or she’s in our system.” I don’t know enough about this shit to know whether or not that’s easy to accomplish. Our camera network is one of those things that has always fallen under the jurisdiction of either Apollo or Hephaestus, depending on what the specific ask is. My father never concerned himself with the details, and he taught me not to as well. It’s only now, when the wheels have come off the bus and everything is on fire, that I wish I knew more about the specific ways Olympus runs in the nitty-gritty detail. It’d make it a lot harder for people to put one over on me.
“Or she has found her way into our system,” Atalanta confirms. She grimaces. “I’d almost admire her if she wasn’t set on death and destruction and all that bullshit.”
“She certainly is capable,” I say neutrally. I was raised to look at everyone around me, except family, as a potential enemy. Atalanta has always had proximity to the Thirteen, and she failed to acquirea title of her own. Surely her ambitions haven’t quieted? “Why haven’t you taken advantage of the assassination clause?You’recertainly capable enough and Artemis repaid your loyalty with pain.”
She laughs, the sound deep and pleasing. “And inherit the mess y’all have made? Absolutely fucking not. I’d rather burn the place to the ground.”
That’s a troubling response, but I keep my expression locked down. She’s not the only one who thinks about burning Olympus to the ground. The sentiment seems to be more and more popular as time goes on. Each day that passes brings new challenges and new ways to fuck everyone over. “I’d prefer to salvage it.”
“Of course you would. If you weren’t Zeus, who would you be?”
She starts to turn toward the door and I realize she never gave me the information that I hadn’t asked for but that she obviously possesses. “Atalanta.”
She pauses and glances over her shoulder, her deep brown eyes glinting in amusement. “Yeah?”
“Where is my wife?” The words feel dragged out of me. I hate admitting any kind of weakness, let alone admitting it to a potential enemy. Considering I can count people who are not potential enemies on one hand and still have fingers left over, it means I rarely admit weakness at all. But if Hera hasn’t been dissuaded from her antics, then I need to know. I’m already looking over my shoulder for half a dozen enemies. I don’t need to be doing it for my wife as well.
At least not any longer. Not after her last attempt failed.
Atalanta grins. “She’s down at Wine About It, day drinking withthat handsome fellow who’s always following her around. Seems like a great place for a romantic encounter.” She strides out of my office before I have a chance to respond.
All theater productions have been postponed until the dust settles. I’m surprised any of those businesses are open at all, let alone that Hera was aware of it.
Even as I tell myself to make the call, to have someone else keep an eye on her, I’m already in motion. I grab my jacket and pull it on, heading out the door. I have access to my email and all of the data systems through my phone. I can look at the information Atalanta gathered on the way. Not that there’s anything to look at. Just empty video feeds.
Circe has to be in this city. Where else would she go? All the Thirteen, excepting Demeter, are in the city proper. Hades is somewhat protected by the secondary barrier still surrounding the lower city, but Circe has proven she can get through Olympus’s barriers. I have no doubt she made contingency plans for this very thing happening. I’d be a fool to assume otherwise, and so would Hades. He won’t be taking any chances, not with his people and not with his pregnant wife.
Persephone, at least, seems willing to listen to her husband and avoid taking unnecessary risks. Unlike her sister, my wife.
I almost call a driver, but I don’t think I can handle yet more people looking at me out of the corner of their eyes, aware of how my wife continues to make a fool of me. Maybe she’s not planning another assassination attempt. Maybe she actuallyishaving an affair with Ixion. He’s handsome enough. Why not make a fool of me in that way, too? She certainly givesmeno softness.
She didn’t want this marriage. It was an act of political expediency. It’s the same reason I married her, needing to get Demeter and all her various alliances on my side instead of working against me. There’s no reason to resent my wife for not caring about me. There’s no reason to care about her at all.
But then, I’ve been a fool in a number of ways. What’s one more?
I don’t call a car. I take one of my own, sliding behind the wheel for the first time in… I honestly can’t remember. Even as a teenager and young adult, I always had a driver who doubled as a bodyguard. Can’t be too careful with the heir to Zeus. If there was an added bonus that he reported my every move to my father, then so much the better.
It feels strange to grip the wheel, to back out of the space, to leave the parking garage and turn out onto the mostly empty road. Strange…but not bad.
I make it to the theater district in record time. The location Atalanta gave me is tucked off the main thoroughfare. I park a few blocks away and walk. It would probably be wiser to stake the building out and see exactly who Hera is meeting, but each step has my barely buried anger rising higher. We don’t have time for this shit. We don’t have time for infighting and backstabbing and political machinations. We have a literal enemy in our midst and my wife is fucking around.
I shove through the doors hard enough that Imbros bolts up from where ze leans against a table and has zir gun halfway drawn before ze registers who I am. Even then, ze doesn’t immediately release the butt of zir gun. Ze eyes me with suspicion.
My wife couldn’t have asked for a better set of protectors…or are they her lovers, too? Why stop at one?
I hate this. I’ve had lovers in the past and I’ve never felt this kind of possessive jealousy. It feels like there’s a monster inside me clawing to get out. Even though this is an arranged marriage of convenience, at least for the first couple of months, Itried. I was kind to her, as much as I’m able to be. I brought her flowers. I found out what kind of food she likes and had it cooked for us. I spent every moment in our bed ensuring that she was experiencing as much pleasure as I was. More, even.
